Tobias Wolff Book order

In This Fish Is Fowl Xu Xi offers the transnational and feminist perspective of a contemporary “glocalized” American life. Xu’s quirky, darkly comic, and obsessively personal essays emerge from her diverse professional career as a writer, business executive, entrepreneur, and educator. From her origins in Hong Kong as an Indonesian of Chinese descent to her U.S. citizenship and multiple countries of residence, she writes her way around the globe. Caring for her mother with Alzheimer’s in Hong Kong becomes the rhythmic accompaniment to an enforced, long-term, long-distance relationship with her partner and home in New York. In between Xu reflects on all her selves, which are defined by those myriad monikers of existence. As an author who began life as a novelist and fiction writer, she also considers the nature of genre, which snakes its way through these essays. In her linguistic trip across the comic tragedy that is globalism, she wonders about the mystery of humanity and the future of our world at this complicated and precarious moment in human existence. This Fish Is Fowl is a twenty-first-century blend of the essayist traditions of both West and East. Xu’s acerbic, deft prose shows her to be a descendant of both Michel de Montaigne and Lu Xun, with influences from stepparent Jonathan Swift.

Dreißig Jahre sind vergangen. Dreißig Jahre, in denen er Mary Claude nicht gesehen, in denen er ein integres Leben als Ehemann, Vater und Internist geführt - und doch täglich an sie gedacht hat. Ihre Küsse, den Schwung ihres Halses, die Möglichkeit eines anderen Lebens. Von geheimen Sehnsüchten, Tagträumen und Selbsttäuschung erzählt Tobias Wolff in seinen neuen Storys, von Einzelgängern und Eigenbrötlern, von notorischen Lügnern, missratenen Söhnen und missgünstigen Nachbarn. Die Weisheit eines ganzen Lebens und tiefe Menschenkenntnis sprechen aus diesen Erzählungen. Das Gespür, mit dem Wolff die Sehnsüchte seiner Figuren ergründet, verborgene Leben hinter den wirklichen enthüllt, Schlüsselbegegnungen in Szene setzt, ist aufs Neue ver blüffend. Unsere Geschichte beginnt. Fünf Jahre sehnlichen Wartens auf den neuen Wolff haben ein Ende.

An outstanding collection of new and classic stories, from one of America's greatest living short story writers

At one prestigious American public school, the boys like to emphasise their democratic ideals -the only acknowledged snobbery is literary snobbery. Once a term, a big name from the literary world visits and a contest takes place. The boys have to submit a piece of writing and the winner receives a private audience with the visitor. But then it is announced that Hemingway, the boys' hero, is coming to the school. The competition intensifies, and the morals the school and the boys pride themselves on - honour, loyalty and friendship - are crumbling under the strain. Only time will tell who will win and what it will cost them.

One of the sinuous and subtly crafted stories in Tobias Wolff's new collection--his first in eleven years--begins with a man biting a dog. The fact that Wolff is reversing familiar expectations is only half the point. The other half is that Wolff makes the reversal seem inevitable: the dog has attacked his protagonist's young daughter. And everywhere in The Night in Question, we are reminded that truth is deceptive, volatile, and often the last thing we want to know. A young reporter writes an obituary only to be fired when its subject walks into his office, very much alive. A soldier in Vietnam goads his lieutenant into sending him on increasingly dangerous missions. An impecunious mother and son go window-shopping for a domesticity that is forever beyond their grasp. Seamless, ironic, dizzying in their emotional aptness, these fifteen stories deliver small, exquisite shocks that leave us feeling invigorated and intensely alive.

Among the characters you'll find in this collection of twelve stories by Tobias Wolff, are a teenage boy who tells morbid lies about his home life, a timid professor who, in the first genuine outburst of her life, pours out her opinions in spite of a protesting audience, a prudish loner who gives an obnoxious hitchhiker a ride, and an elderly couple on a golden anniversary cruise who endure the offensive conviviality of the ship's social director.Fondly yet sharply drawn, Wolff's characters stumble over each other in their baffled yet resolute search for the "right path."

Exploring the complexities of life after war, this collection of ten stories delves into the struggles of characters seeking a semblance of normalcy. From a gentle priest encountering a frantic stranger in Vegas to a hopeful performer facing an unusual audition in a hearse, each narrative reveals the tension between reality and aspiration. Wolff masterfully captures the poignant moments of his characters, highlighting their disconnection from societal norms and the often harsh truths they face, all with a blend of lucidity and grace.

The Bloomsbury Birthday Quids are small editions of short stories by major writers, in a format and style of the Bloomsbury Classics. Printed on high-quality paper, designed by Jeff Fisher, the books should become collectors' items. This title is Two Boys and a Girl by Tobias Wolff.